You can see how our culture is dominated by verbal people with the response to Trump's recent Freudian tweet.
Mathematics is just nowhere to be found these days.
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) December 17, 2016
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) December 17, 2016
13 comments:
Not enough STEM or IT people in our country it seems. The English majors rule. I think about why so many people can't seem to understand MMT concepts, and having a lack of basic accounting, scientific or mathematical (and anything analytics related) background seems to be a big factor as to why that could be.
This country is still lagging behind in that regard.
http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/02/02/u-s-students-improving-slowly-in-math-and-science-but-still-lagging-internationally/
But yeah, if this is more of a global issue, then I'm terrified for the future. I don't care about how Trump spells his tweets or if he even decided to write a bunch of new tweets in all caps. I care about what his policies and actions will be in that regard.
For the people trying to be critical of him, Trump spelling a word wrong shows them that he has an intellect of a third grader. That's not me saying it, but that's the conclusion they have given. I've been following Michael Tracey's Twitter page for a while and he raised good points about journalists overreacting to every single thing Trump tweets out.
I rest my case.
https://twitter.com/KeithOlbermann/status/810622901560967168
https://twitter.com/KeithOlbermann/status/810149081309937664
Not enough STEM or IT people in our country it seems.
I don't think the problem is a dearth of STEM people. The problem is that very few go into politics for some reason.
A reason that STEM people don't go into politics in the US may that they are not verbal people, and politics is about persuasion. It requires extensive verbal skills.
STEM people are at a disadvantage in this area because they think in terms of facts and numbers and the voters not only don't but are turned off by facts and numbers.
STEM people have probably tried to get into politics and left when they were unsuccessful.
Case in point.
No, Larry Kudlow Is Not an Economist…
This is why LK is DJT's chief economic adviser instead of a real economist.
LK, like DJT, is a television personality and knows how to communicate with the public.
that's exactly who I was thinking of!
History major...
"If you print money, you're Weimar Germany!"
Here is another one, fro The Nation.
Larry Kudlow Isn’t an Economist, but He Plays One on TV
Perception is reality. The narrative controls perception.
Politics is about persuasion that shapes "reality" rather than investigating reality.
Keynes's degree in mathematics was ultimately irrelevant to his economics. Adam Smith, David Hume and Karl Marx were philosophers. David Ricardo left school at fourteen. Norman Mailer studied engineering! Etc, etc. Anyway, look at all the goddamn idiots who did study STEM or economics and have been a disaster for the subject.
The subject that one studies at university is relatively unimportant. It's what you learn afterwards that's crucial: Keynes, Kalecki, Godley.
Norman Mailer studied engineering! The very least that can be said is engineering's loss is literature's gain.
As for history, Edward Witten was a history major, although he then went on to do a PhD in physics, and has been the leader of the theoretical particle physics community since the eighties and in the nineties created M Theory.
Darwin's studies were aimed at becoming an Anglican vicar. Again, it's what you learn after getting a degree. Any damn fool can get a degree. Education is more than that. As the greatest American writer once wrote: "I never let my schooling get in the way of my education."
Kudlow isn't an idiot because he studied history. He's just another useful idiot. The man could have PhDs in genetic engineering, theoretical physics, biochemistry, materials science and a dozen other subjects, and it wouldn't make any difference in the slightest. The man has the job he has because he doesn't know anything about the specific subject he's paid to pontificate about. He's an ideologue.
People who really understand the world do not get to do Kudlow's job, and they wouldn't want it even if offered it: it eventually rots your brain and your soul. Ask Magic Mike Norman. He quit because it was eating his soul.
Think Carson, the man may be a neurologist, he is still an ignorant fool...
Normative education is not that important. I keep telling Matt, I'm pretty sure almost all of it is setled before a person being in his 20's.
If they haven't acquired the critical thinking and analytical skills by then, they are "ruined" (not necessarily, as not everybody needs to have the same sort of skills). The problem is we have a system that is not placing people where they should be.
We don't have a good enough management and incentive system going on... Money matters too much and money attracts the corrupt and "smart" types to positions of leadership/power on big institutions (be them public or private), not necessarily the competent ones at managing material systems (as Matt would say).
I bet we got a drastic reduction in income disparity, more like the 50's and things would automatically get better.
Is all about having the wrong social incentive structure.
Ignacio, exactly! Carson is one of the best example of a highly intelligent dunderheaded imbecilic ignoramus of the highest order with gold oak leaf clusters.
I'll change what I said before about what you learn after a degree. It's also, as Ignacio says, what you learn before your degree and your general attitude and acceptance of new ideas and willingness to entertain original thinking, whether before, during or after your formal education. Depending on the subject, that, however, may be drummed out of you quickly. And even in areas where original thinking is required - STEM subjects - peer pressure is brought to bear such that the subjects get caught up in a muddy swamp from which it is hard to escape: evolutionary synthesis, string theory, inflationary cosmology, neuroscience, quantum mechanics, etc.
As a personal matter, and I'm sure almost anyone here has a similar experience, I have met very intelligent and critical thinking people who didn't even get to finish high school, would take any day of the week over some engineers or scientists if I wanted to get certain things done.
People acquire skills and knowledge in many different ways, but critical and/or creative thinking, and independence or ability to resist gregarious behavior are not about formal normative teaching (instead many times is encouraged!).
We certainly need to know a lot more about how skills are acquired and when...
"I'm sure almost anyone here has a similar experience, I have met very intelligent and critical thinking people who didn't even get to finish high school, would take any day of the week over some engineers or scientists if I wanted to get certain things done."
Definitely, while some of the dumbest bastards I've ever met had a thousand different qualifications after their names. Arrogance and ignorance comes with fancy qualifications, as it does with the right university. The fancier the university, the dumber you can afford to be. And if you can add a posh English voice to it all and been trained to sneer at the plebs then you can be the dumbest bastard there's ever been and you'll be held aloft as a genius: British newspapers are full of these dumb bastards. Their ignorance is breathtaking!
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